Sydney Supercars: De Pasquale, Whincup share poles

De Pasquale continued his impressive SMP form in the first 10-minute session, the Dick Johnson Racing star grabbing his sixth pole of the Sydney swing and 10th of the season with a 1m29.201s.

That left him 0.25s clear of teammate Will Davison.

Jamie Whincup was third fastest while Will Brown split the Triple Eight drivers, dropping van Gisbergen back to fifth.

Things could get worse for van Gisbergen too, the Kiwi under investigation for impeding Jack Le Brocq in the first session.

Triple Eight hit back in the second session, Whincup leading a one-two for the Holden squad with a 1m28.929s.

The gap back to van Gisbergen was just over two-tenths, while De Pasquale was third, another hundredth back.

Will Brown, who ran early in the session, was shuffled back to fourth.

"We maximised our set-up [in the second session]," said Whincup. "It was interesting, car #11 decided to go in the pack and maybe got a little held up. We just stuck to our guns, went out with clean air in front, and happy days.

"It was all about maximising me, it's a driver's track, you've got to nail every corner. I made a bit of a gain from the first [session]."

De Pasquale added: "It's not a bad day when your shocker is third. You always want to be in that top three or five, in contention for the race win. A pole and a third, we'll take that any day of the week."

Team 18 enjoyed an improved qualifying effort, Mark Winterbottom and Scott Pye sixth and eighth respectively in the first session. Pye then qualified ninth in the second session while Winterbottom lost some ground and ended up 13th.

Davison had a shocker of a second session too, ending up 15th on the grid for Race 3.

It was a tough pair of sessions for Kelly Grove Racing, Andre Heimgartner's 16th in the first the best result. He and Luke Youlden were 22nd and 23rd in the second session.